Last Day Off

Today is my last day before reporting back to the world of employment as an elementary school teacher. Monday I have Orientation, and then I finally go to my school on Tuesday. I guess I am ready! I have been trying to get my ducks in a row. My Bernina and Featherweight are both being serviced, my watch is repaired, my car is inspected, my teeth have been cleaned, my hair is cut, so let's go to work!

Saturday I went to a planning meeting for my 40th high school reunion. I went to Cary High School in North Carolina, which is in the same county where I now live. The reunion planning committee has been meeting monthly in Cary. It was so fun to see classmates together again! These planning lunches are very popular- people drove in from as far as Maryland and Asheville, NC. I hope to be able to attend all of the lunches. In the photo I am sandwiched between uber-slim Carol and not-so-slim Wilbert, who was one of the most interesting and humorous lunch attendees. I don't even remember him from high school, but we had a great conversation at lunch!

My new book arrived this week- what an array of inspirational quilts derived from photographs!

Wendy Butler Berns is a talented art quilter. Her method is to enlarge a photo, trace it to make a line drawing, enlarge it to make a master pattern, and make freezer paper templates from it. The freezer paper templates are used to iron on to fabrics. She uses the gluestick technique to turn under the edges. This whole technique is similar to the Sharon Malec patterns I have used for Change of Season and Golden Memories. She has lots of gorgeous quilts for inspiration, as well as some project quilts to make for practice.

This technique works well, but has the disadvantage that the freezer paper is on top of the applique pieces, and you can't see how your fabric looks unless you remove the paper. She offers some suggestions on how to preview your pieces. Great book!

Change of Season

Golden Memories

Another Little Quilted Critter

At the last minute, I decided to make a little gift to take with me last weekend when we visited the McBrayers in the western part of North Carolina. Charlie's brother Richard and his wife Phylis have hosted us for many Christmases past. This is no small task, as I well know from having all of my family over for a big Christmas dinner. Richard and Phylis are cat lovers, and lost their long-time family pet, Simba, due to illness this year. I wanted to make them a Simba quilt. I did not have a picture to refer to, but remembered Simba as a big, friendly orange cat. It must have been somewhat close, because Phylis started crying as soon as she saw it. I named it Golden Memories.

The pattern is once again one I purchased from Sharon Malec, who is known for her animal portraits. This pattern was called Tabby Cat. When I finished piecing, this is how it looked.

I asked my husband if he thought it looked like Simba, and he gave a non-committal "sort of." I decided I had not used enough orange, so I got out my Tsukineko inks and went over the cat areas with several shades of orange and gold ink, including some metallic. I also gave him some eyeballs.

I thought that looked better, so I started quilting. I used a thin batt, possibly Thermolam, behind a batting of Warm and Natural. I found that when I made Miranda's horse quilt, the batting needed to be a little firmer to hang right with all the quilting I put in.

By the way, isn't that a great backing fabric? I have a good supply of hand-dyed fabric, and I think this piece was purchased from Ricky Tims. It certainly gives an art quilt a good start to have a beautiful piece of cloth to work with.